this post was submitted on 18 Aug 2026
143 points (98.0% liked)

Technology

87337 readers
4667 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related news or articles.
  3. Be excellent to each other!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
  10. Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.

Approved Bots

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
L3s@lemmy.world
enu@lemmy.world
technopagan@lemmy.world
L4s@lemmy.world
L3s@hackingne.ws
143
How weaving helped invent modern computing - and is shaping its future (theconversation.com)
submitted 1 day ago by new_otters_raft@piefed.ca to c/technology@lemmy.world
7 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

TLDR on the history side of the article

In 1804, a French weaver named Joseph-Marie Jacquard patented a loom that could weave intricate patterns using punch cards — paper cards with encoded holes.

Once they pass through the loom, the presence or absence of a hole tells the loom which warp thread to raise or lower, acting as the earliest form of binary code programming. Weaving that once required a master weaver and an assistant could now be done by craft hobbyists.

top 7 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] HubertManne@piefed.social 7 points 21 hours ago

in grade school our art teacher had a loom. was the coolest thing to me at that time.

[–] Lord_Fartwad@feddit.uk 39 points 1 day ago (2 children)

And based on this card, IBM and others developed the 40 / 80 character punch cards which are the reason SAP IS STILL ONLY SUPPORTING 40 CHARACTERS PER FIELD

[–] MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip 1 points 12 hours ago

Is it that nobody dares touch the core or nobody can touch the core?

[–] massive_bereavement@fedia.io 13 points 23 hours ago

I imagine dying and then in hell, during the interview with the devil as it browses through my life story: "Well, I saw enough , you will be fixing our SAP servers from now onwards." "Eh? Why is my previous job my punishment?" "Punishment? Oh no, we just run our.." the devil stares at my face for a minute "ok, I can see this working both ways, excellent."

[–] wasabi_noir@lemmy.zip 6 points 20 hours ago

[–] db2@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

Or alternately,

[–] db2@lemmy.world 12 points 1 day ago